


Ghost Towns

by plalligator



Category: Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins
Genre: Alternate Universe - Historical, Gen, Great Depression
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-05-26
Updated: 2012-05-26
Packaged: 2017-11-06 01:00:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 416
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/412969
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/plalligator/pseuds/plalligator
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They say it started with the drought. </p><p>(District 12 in Depression-era America)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ghost Towns

**Author's Note:**

> Saw [this prompt](http://sister-wife.livejournal.com/15920.html?thread=126512#t126512) while looking through the Americana ficathon and could not resist the siren song of American history. (That's not even sarcasm, either!)
> 
> **NOTE: While strictly speaking no archive warnings do apply to this fic, there are discussions of poverty and starvation in a fairly explicit way. Please proceed with caution if necessary.**

They say it started with the drought.

(Some others say it started when we first began to farm the land, that we were too greedy and too eager and tore the life out of the soil; that we took what the earth gave us and weren’t content, that we had to dig deep into her and let her bleed. But how were we to know? We were just trying to make a living.)

It started with the drought, but then came the dust, and the locusts and the grasshoppers. Then the prices fell, until we were selling our crops for pennies; and then the railroad raised the rates so we couldn’t afford to ship them. And then there were taxes, so we lost what little we earned.

::

We thought it was bad five years ago. We were hungry five years ago, and we worked hard.

Five years ago, my hands were calloused. Now, they are as tanned and tough as old leather, and the split skin on the knuckles leaks cherry-bright blood, sometimes, stung by harsh soap and too little protection against the winter air.

Five years ago, you could see my ribs raised under the skin of my belly, but just barely. Five years ago, Prim was thin as a stick, no fat to pad out her body, but she at least had color in her cheeks. Now, my ribs are sharp ridges visible through my clothing. Sharp enough to cut yourself on. Now, Prim is little more than a bone doll wrapped in a grey husk of skin.

We thought it was bad, but at least we could put food on the table and still have a little money to spare. At least Father had work, most days. Now he doesn’t. Now he just sits and stares at the floor. Mother isn’t much better.

We thought it was bad, but most of all, we thought it couldn’t get worse.

We were wrong.

::

We didn’t believe them when they called it Black Tuesday, because how could something in the world of banks and millionaires so far removed from us even affect us?

::

For a while, me and Gale used to earn a little selling jugs of moonshine to dark-suited men with hats pulled low over their faces. Now even that’s gone, and there’s not a job left in town. People try to help each other, but we can only do so much.

I just don’t know what to do anymore.

What _can_ we do anymore?


End file.
